


Discworld Drabbles (2004-present)

by Mireille



Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: Community: discworld100, Drabble Collection, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2004-02-04
Updated: 2004-06-30
Packaged: 2019-03-09 21:26:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13490091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mireille/pseuds/Mireille
Summary: Discworld drabbles, mostly written for discworld100 on LiveJournal. Were all exactly 100 words by the word-count tool on the version of Word I was using at the time, though sometimes AO3 disagrees.Gen unless otherwise noted. (In which case, I'll update the headers.)





	1. Defining the Problem (discworld100: "magic")

Ponder Stibbons was a wizard, so he thought of magic as something--not alive, but close. Magic could want things, magic could run wild.

Most wizards thought it was nearly intelligent and vaguely malicious--you had to be careful or it would Get You But Good.

Ponder was only secondly a wizard (there wasn't a word on the Disc for what he really was, though other wizards had suggested a few), and he knew better. Magic wasn't smart; it was stupid, and the reason it went wahooni-shaped on you was that you didn't tell it what to do carefully enough.


	2. discworld100: "conventions"

Most of the time, Lancre was only represented by Granny Weatherwax; Agnes still didn't feel comfortable showing off in front of a crowd, and Magrat hadn't either - not to mention that Magrat probably would have showed off a collection of "interestin' herbs" or something. 

Nanny Ogg didn't go to the Witch Trials most years, either; she said there wasn't enough beer to suit her.

It didn't matter. They were still talking about what she'd done the first time she'd gone, fifty years ago, although mostly in hushed tones, and only as "that thing Gytha Ogg did with a bananana."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [me on tumblr](https://mireille719.tumblr.com/)


	3. discworld100: "sleep"

Watchmen didn't sleep the sleep of the just.

In fact, there was some question among the Watch of what, exactly, that was; Carrot said it was the untroubled slumber of the honest man, but Commander Vimes pointed out that the honest man frequently slept rather nervously because they were known all around Ankh-Morpork as easy targets, whereas the right bastards tended to have heavily armed guards and their own nasty reputations to protect them while they slumbered. 

In the end, they decided that since what Watchmen slept was the sleep of the dog-tired, or occasionally the dead drunk, it didn't matter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [me on tumblr](https://mireille719.tumblr.com/)


	4. Like the Back of His Hand (discworld100: poetry challenge)

He was neither a fool nor a madman, and he'd never intended to try to make Ankh-Morpork into some sort of utopia. What Havelock Vetinari had wanted for the city was to make it work.

The Guilds, the Watch, the clacks, the peculiar approach to diplomacy: all part of his plan.

Things worked in ways that most people might think they shouldn't (and couldn't), but they did work, and perhaps that was the only way that Ankh-Morpork could work.

Vetinari's life's work might have looked like chaos to some, but in his own opinion, it was turning out quite well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The poem that inspired this one (that was the challenge) was W.H. Auden's "Epitaph on a Tyrant." 
> 
> [me on tumblr](https://mireille719.tumblr.com/)


	5. discworld100: "stars and/or planets"

The world was carried by a giant turtle, the wise men in M'Bu's village said, and he had no reason not to believe them. 

On the turtle's back, they also said, were four elephants, and M'Bu believed that, too.

Sometimes the wise men would argue about the size of the elephants, and that was just what wise men did.

But M'Bu worked for the stock dealer, and while he didn't know philosophy, he knew elephants. And if those four were big enough to carry the entire Disc, then M'Bu was just glad that he didn't have to shovel the dung.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those who haven't read _Moving Pictures_ lately, M'Bu is a minor character in it.
> 
>  
> 
> [me on tumblr](https://mireille719.tumblr.com/)


	6. discworld100: "quotation"

"Is it not said in the Book of Om that the path to righteousness is dark and fraught with many perils?"

Sergeant Colon frowned. "So you're saying Sweetheart Lane is the path to righteousness? The path to an early grave, more like it."

"The point is--"

"--going to be between your ribs, if you're walking down Sweetheart Lane after dark," pronounced Nobby.

Constable Visit sighed. It was also said in the Book of Om that some minds couldn't be enlightened if you cracked their heads open and shone a torch through the hole--or at least, it ought to be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [me on tumblr](https://mireille719.tumblr.com/)


	7. Klatchian Spotted Fever

Commander Vimes frowned. "Grandmother's funeral again, Nobby? How many does that make so far--fourteen?"   
  
"Nasty stuff, Klatchian Spotted Fever, sir. Very fatal."   
  
"Very imaginary, too; there's no such thing as Klatchian Spotted Fever."   
  
Nobby gave him his best attempt at an innocent grin, although the closest he could get was something more like "not proven due to key witnesses having decided to go for a swim in the Ankh with a hundredweight of bricks in their pockets and their mouths open." "Has to be, sir, else what did our gran die of?"   
  
Vimes shook his head wearily. "Just go, Nobby."

**Author's Note:**

> [me on tumblr](https://mireille719.tumblr.com/)


End file.
